Meaning & Origins

Latinate form of a post-classical Greek name, from dōron ‘gift’ + theos ‘god’ (the same elements as in Theodora, but in reverse order). The masculine form Dorotheus was borne by several early Christian saints, the feminine by only two minor ones, but only the girl's name has survived. In modern use in the English-speaking world it represents either a 19th-century Latinization of Dorothy or a learned reborrowing.